A few days of rain has made a small impact in the water shed but is it enough to get us out of stage 3 water restrictions in Alice?
The city received heavy rain these last few couple of days.
"A single rain event doesn't necessarily change where we're at in our drought contingency plan or where we're at as far as a drought,” Alice City Manager Michael Esparza said.
Esparza received a copy of a pass-thru report from the Nueces River Authority. This report shows the lake levels and the evaluation rate.
"I just got our pass-thru, today, report from Lake Corpus Christi and it did go up to 80.7 feet. Yesterday it went up from 79.8 to 80.2. So, it does make a little impact but still to get us out of stage three we would need to be above 82 for at least seven days,” he said.
Alice currently gets its water from Lake Corpus Christi and the impact must be felt there. Some water was delivered directly into Lake Corpus Christi.
"But, uncertainly the rain is nice to have. It helps the soil and it helps everybody that needs to get irrigation going and things like that. But, it doesn't change a whole lot as far as where we're at in the drought,” Esparza said.
The rain did help bring life to Alice resident’s Diana Monsevais Gonzalez’s plants.
"I loved the rain. It gave us a little bit of rain,” she said.
Gonzalez uses a bucket or bottled water to water plants. She understands the importance of everyone following all water restrictions. However, when she goes around town she sees the difference in lawns.
"I feel that maybe it would help us if they were equal with everybody. And not have some yards look gorgeous green and some are dead because their laws are different for different people,” she said.
Gonzalez said we all should be doing our part before we run out of water.
"Well, I hope it continues to rain. Not only for us but for the farmers and ranchers that need the rain,” she said.
The city continues to work on the construction of the brackish desalination plant. Esparza said the whole idea on the plant is to be drought resistant in the future.
"We're getting closer. We going to be sending sampling water to get tested here pretty quick. Hopefully to TCEQ. And trying to get approval to get that water into our system,” Esparza said.
Alice City Manager said officials will review the drought contingency plan in a few months. For now, he continues to urge everyone to follow all water restrictions currently in place.
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